


Their Harmony Foretells

by Laura JV (jacquez)



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-12
Updated: 2019-06-12
Packaged: 2020-05-02 06:47:55
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,150
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19193839
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jacquez/pseuds/Laura%20JV
Summary: On an endless night, silver star spangledThe bells from the chapel went jingle-jangleDo you love me?





	Their Harmony Foretells

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to [Laura Shapiro](https://archiveofourown.org/users/laurashapiro/pseuds/Laura%20Shapiro) for the idea, and the beta. 
> 
> This could be either TV or book canon, when it comes down to it.

 

* * *

One of the first things Crowley noticed about Aziraphale was that he rang like a bell. His presence was a vibration in the fabric of the cosmos, and Crowley could, after a time, recognize him by the feel of it. The first time they touched, Aziraphale’s soft hand warm in his, Crowley’s entire body rang with him: a clear, sweet thrill.

 

It took him years to realize it was the touch of grace — angels being more-or-less nipped-off bits of the same, imbued with consciousness — that made Aziraphale feel that way. Crowley had no particular love for his lost angelic status, but the pain of losing grace had never left him: there'd been a euphonious wonder to it, a sense of great and ineffable power. Being close to Aziraphale felt like being close to that grace again, like an enveloping warmth, or (on days when Hell was a bit too present to Crowley's mind), like the barrel of cool water into which one plunges a flaming sword. For lack of a better word, Aziraphale felt _good_.

 

Crowley tried not to imagine what being close to him -- touching him -- was like for Aziraphale; desperately hoped that touching him was not like touching a black hole, like echoing silence. Aziraphale never flinched when their fingers brushed, sometimes let his hand rest on Crowley’s shoulder, and once had kissed him on the cheek in delight when Crowley brought him a first edition of Wilde’s _A House of Pomegranates_ — though both of them were careful not to touch often. It would never do to have their arrangement discovered by their respective sides, after all.

 

Except now, of course, it didn’t matter. Now they were on their own side, and their old sides knew it. It wasn’t, quite, like free will, but it wasn’t quite like being ground into obedience (or disobedience), either. Aziraphale had let himself be tempted to lunch, and then afterwards to Crowley’s flat for a drink, and now he stood in Crowley’s bedroom, his hands folded in front of him, all silver and pink and cream, a little soft around the edges with wine, and his presence ringing as bright as ever in the metaphorical air. “Are you going to sleep tonight?” he asked.

 

“Only if you are,” Crowley answered, somewhat reluctantly. He’d rather sleep — he _liked_ sleep — but Aziraphale didn’t care for it.

 

“You know I won’t,” Aziraphale said, “but if _you_ want to, I’ll stay with you.”

 

Crowley stared at him and forgot to blink. Aziraphale removed his shoes and coat, and hung the coat on a miraculously-appearing wooden valet. He removed his tie and waistcoat, and unbuttoned his collar. Crowley wanted to touch the hollow of his throat, but before he could reach out, Aziraphale stepped away. He arranged himself on top of Crowley’s bed, crossed his ankles, and patted the pillow beside him. “You do look tired,” he said, and Crowley gave in. He miracled himself some soft black pyjamas and crawled under the duvet. Aziraphale’s body was warm beside him, and he sighed into the pillow, relaxing into the _goodness_ — the grace that Aziraphale still rang with, pure-toned and clean. Aziraphale slid one hand onto his back, into the extradimensional space where his wings lived — Crowley could have wept for joy — and left it there, his fingers moving gently along Crowley’s feathers. “Go to sleep,” he said, and Crowley closed his eyes, let the movement of Aziraphale's hand soothe him, drifted down into sleep.

 

He woke, some hours later, his entire consciousness ringing, his entire body struck by the bell of Aziraphale’s. He’d curled around him in his sleep, laid his head on his thigh; his fingers had crept beneath Aziraphale's shirt to his bare stomach, and that touch had woken him, vibrating up his arm and into whatever was left of his heart. Aziraphale’s hand on his back; Aziraphale’s scent in his nostrils. “Oh, hello,” Aziraphale said, stroking upwards along his spine, and Crowley opened his mouth and breathed out, hot and helpless, against the fabric of Aziraphale’s trousers.

 

It is possible that he whimpered, because Aziraphale said, “Oh, my dear—“ and lifted him with his blessed angelic strength: hauled him upright and into his side, his arms and the great sweeping curve of his wings enclosing them, the windchime rustle of his feathers. Crowley pressed his face to Aziraphale’s collarbone, touched his mouth to the skin of Aziraphale’s throat—

 

The world blurred away. Aziraphale blinked his hundred thousand eyes and beat his silvery wings, and Crowley cried out, seized and shaken; Aziraphale had four hands, eight hands, and they were everywhere on his naked skin. “Good,” he said, into the bright void of wherever they were; “oh, ‘sssssssss _good_ ,” everything in him tolling to Aziraphale’s bell, grace in his eyes and throat and throbbing through him, ecstatic, blinding, endless.

 

They were back in his bed. He could smell his plants, his own skin, ozone, Aziraphale. They were dressed, soft fabric between their bodies. He trembled with aftershocks, and Aziraphale took a deep, shuddering breath, shaking both of them together one last time. Crowley’s mouth was still pressed to the warm skin of Aziraphale’s throat, and he flickered his tongue against one strong tendon. “What in heaven -- was that sex, angel?”

 

“Not human sex, certainly,” Aziraphale replied, and brushed his lips against Crowley’s forehead. His hands were steady on Crowley’s back and hip, his wings tucked away, and his heartbeat slowing under Crowley’s ear. “Ethereal sex?”

 

Crowley laughed, weakly. “Occult sex.”

 

“Or something new,” Aziraphale said. "It's blasphemous to even _think_ about what it was most like." Crowley thought of the ecstasy of worship; the sense of the Divine. The way all harmonies led to the Harmony of the Spheres. He sighed, and said nothing. Aziraphale kissed his forehead, again, and said, “I don’t think angels and demons have ever...done that before. Whatever it was.”

Crowley slid his arm around Aziraphale’s waist and tugged him closer. “We’ve done lots of things angels and demons haven’t done before, angel.”

 

“True,” Aziraphale said, shifting slightly so that Crowley’s arm slid higher, onto his ribcage.

 

It implied discomfort, that shift; it implied that something about Crowley’s touch was unwelcome, despite everything. And yet Aziraphale seemed happy enough; his own arms still wrapped around Crowley in an embrace. “Do you like it,” Crowley said, carefully, “when I touch you?”

 

Aziraphale hummed, deep in his chest. “Of course I do,” he said. “Touching you is like — oh, a bit like banging a gong, I suppose. Deep and reverberant and — yes, a little bit wrong — but you must know, my dear, that I love you.” He tightened his fingers, strong and exquisitely manicured, on Crowley's hip.

 

Crowley leaned up, pressed his mouth to Aziraphale's, kissed him well and true: teeth and tongue, wet and slick and very nearly human. "You're an entire blessed paean of bells yourself," he said.

 

* * *

**_The End_ **

  


**Author's Note:**

> The title is from the wedding bells verse of Edgar Allan Poe’s [“The Bells.”](https://poets.org/poem/bells) You know what to make of it. There’s also a reference in there to T. Rex’s [“Bang a Gong (Get it On)”](https://genius.com/T-rex-get-it-on-bang-a-gong-lyrics) because I live to crack my own self up, and the summary is from Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds' ["Do You Love Me?"](https://genius.com/Nick-cave-and-the-bad-seeds-do-you-love-me-lyrics)
> 
> Inspired/directly inflicted upon the reading public by [this Twitter thread](https://twitter.com/laurajshapiro/status/1138113614638792704).

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Their Harmony Foretells [Podfic]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20356867) by [aethel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/aethel/pseuds/aethel)




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